The cold temperatures seem to have taken an extra-long time to arrive this year. Not that I’m complaining. I love the middle range temperatures in the 60’s and 70’s. However, some plants need the cooler temperatures to complete their growing cycle.

For example, I love to have collards for Thanksgiving and for Christmas dinners. Collards have a sweeter flavor if they have experienced a frost or freeze before they are cooked. This Thanksgiving, I had to wash the collards and put them in the freezer overnight to have a similar effect on them. I still think a natural frost makes them taste better than a night in the freezer.

Many cole crops (cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and others) are biennial plants, meaning they need two seasons to complete their life cycle. I planted some cauliflower this fall as an experiment to see if the different colors have different flavors. We haven’t had enough cool temperatures for them to produce flower buds for tasting. Hopefully, we will get to taste them before Christmas this year.

Other crops like onions and garlic are cool season vegetables that will grow through the winter and then produce the bulb in the spring as the temperatures warm up.

Living here on the coast allows us to grow a few crops the entire year. Carrots, rutabaga, and turnips, when planted in the late summer or early fall, can be harvested throughout the winter as can cilantro and dill.